Clear-eyed in the Arctic: the Biden-Putin summit

The recent Geneva-based summit between President Joe Biden and Russian President Vladimir Putin appears to have slowed the rapid deterioration of the U.S.-Russia relationship. The meeting established a dialogue for greater understanding and predictability for the two powers’ strategic interests.

From remarks made before, during and after the summit, it appears that the Russian Arctic region is a Kremlin red line, and perhaps offers the most important opportunity for strategic cooperation in the high North, a region that is warming three times faster than the rest of the world.

The sea-ice retreat is opening the previously ice-bound region for commerce — mainly oil, gas, mining and shipping. President Biden expressed his view that the U.S. and Russia can work collaboratively in the Arctic region, long known as a “zone of peace.”

The U.S. president displayed a willingness to improve the contentious relationship as he had, in advance, waived sanctions for the Nord Stream 2 project and agreed to mutual redeployment of ambassadors. Additionally, by his very presence, President Biden elevated the Russian President as an equal on a world stage.

In Putin’s follow-up press conference, while dodging the cyberspace issues and the fate of opposition leader Alexei Navalny, he confirmed the Arctic’s enormous significance to Russia’s economy, security and sovereignty.

Putin also emphasized that there should also be grounds for collaboration with the U.S. given the proximity between Russia and the United States across the narrow Bering Sea and strait, the “gateway to the Arctic.”

Yet both presidents brought attention to potential flashpoints. Just before the historic summit, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov warned against western nations’ staking claims to Russian Arctic by flatly stating, “this is our land and our water.”

Having promised a presidency that would strengthen the trans-Atlantic alliances, Biden met with the European Group of Seven (G7) and 30-member NATO on his way to the summit, bringing the power of Euro-American solidarity in support of his red lines.

With 25% of Russia’s investments located in the fast-melting Arctic, the Kremlin is incentivizing new untapped oil and gas with tax breaks for exploration, production and shipment. Seeking greater reliability in its Northern Sea Route for increased shipping, the Kremlin has updated its ports, improved its search-and-rescue, upgraded safe harbor dual use defense capabilities for its expanding trade route. Its joint ventures with China in offshore petroleum and liquefied natural gas adds a yet uncertain strategic dimension to the Arctic.

The Kremlin has upgraded its considerable icebreaking fleet of 40, including five nuclear-powered breakers. As new Arctic bases open, Russia’s Northern Fleet will continue to strengthen.

In the recent years, the two Arctic powers have agreed upon environment standards in the region. Russian and U.S.-backed treaties in the Bering Sea and beyond cover search and rescue, spill response and shipping lanes, along with the recent multinational Central Arctic Ocean Agreement (CAO) that bans fishing in what will become a Mediterranean-sized ocean by the end of the century. These agreements set the stage for a larger security architecture in which the U.S., the Arctic’s largest economy, and Russia, the Arctic’s largest nation, serve as the guiding forces.

Critical differences at national security levels are likely to be ironed out. The United States does not recognize Russia’s Northern Sea Route, or Canada’s Northwest Passage, as internal waters. Instead, the U.S. defines the two nations’ coastal waters as international straits, where freedom of navigation applies rather than domestic rules of navigation applicable to internal straits.

Thus far, an agree-to-disagree approach has prevailed. But, with the melting sea-ice, Russia plans to use the NSR on a larger scale. This issue could emerge as a point of contention even as Russia is far more capable of governing their coastal waters.

The U.S. has not yet ratified the United Nations Law of the Sea (UNCLOS) Treaty. Alaska Sen. Lisa Murkowski has stated the lack of ratification “diminishes” the U.S. ability to garner international respect on related issues.

Given the legal disagreements on coastal waters, including the location of the jurisdictional line in the Bering Sea, it is not unreasonable that the Kremlin might be concerned about the recent elevations of the Arctic region by the US Defense Department. Further, should NATO further gaze northward, Russia could feel “hemmed in,” virtually guaranteeing a bad outcome.

Given the mutual security interests, a security communications architecture consistent with the type of cooperative strategic actions discussed in the Geneva summit, is vital rather than move an adversary into “enemy” status.

Whether a cooperative spirit consistent with the Arctic’s “zone of peace” remains to be seen.

A State Department official wrote to me of Arctic security concerns, “Our intent is to engage Russia in ways that advance our interests while remaining very clear eyed about the challenge it poses.”

The Biden-Putin summit appears to have put positive strategic possibility on course in the Arctic.

Anita L. Parlow is a recent Fulbright scholar in Iceland, Team Lead for the inaugural Woodrow Wilson Polar Code Roundtable Project, and advisor for the Harvard–MIT Arctic Fisheries Project.

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